The Prevalence of Campylobacter spp. in Polish Poultry Meat

The prevalence, count and molecular identification of Campylobacter spp. in Polish poultry meat were analysed. 181 samples of meat from chicken (70), turkey (47), duck (54) and goose (10) were studied. Campylobacter spp. was found in 64% of meat samples. The highest prevalence of this pathogen was detected for duck meat. On average 80% of duck samples were contaminated with Campylobacter spp. The counts of Campylobacter spp. in positive samples remained under ten colony forming units per gram of product in 59% of poultry meat. C. jejuni was more frequently detected in poultry meat than C. coli

Survey of Domestic Refrigerator Storage Temperatures in Poland for Use as a QMRA Tool for Exposure Assessment

In the framework of Quantitative Microbiological Risk Assessment, the estimation of the ingested dose of a hazard by the consumer is of paramount importance. This may be calculated by means of predictive modeling of growth/inactivation of the pathogen studied. For products that spend the majority of their shelf life in the domestic refrigerator, storage temperature will significantly impact the microbial population dynamics. To describe the variability of domestic storage temperatures in Poland, a survey including 77 participants, was carried out in Lodz, Poland. Participants were provided with temperature data loggers, which measured their refrigerator temperature for 24 h in 5-min intervals. The temperature-time profiles were used to calculate the mean working temperature, standard deviation, minimum and maximum values, and the data were statistically analyzed to find the best fitting probability distribution using R programming language. Out of the tested refrigerators, 49.35% had a mean working temperature of over 5 °C and 3.9% exceeded 10 °C. Distribution fitting scenarios were tested for goodness of fit, and the final selected distribution was a truncated normal distribution. This study can prove useful in Monte Carlo simulation analysis for stochastic quantitative food risk assessment in Poland

Quantitative microbiological risk assessment of traditional food of animal origin produced in short supply chains in Poland

Abstract Polish raw‐milk cheeses produced in short supply chains may pose a threat to consumer safety due to pathogen presence. Listeria monocytogenes is a bacterium of great importance for the food safety of refrigerated RTE foods due to its ability to grow at refrigeration temperatures. During the EU‐FORA fellowship, a stochastic risk assessment was designed and executed to estimate the risk for consumers from L. monocytogenes in these products. The aim was to develop a probabilistic QMRA model that would incorporate the variability and uncertainty of the model's inputs such as prevalence, initial concentration levels, product intrinsic factors, domestic storage temperature and consumer behaviour. The project involved data collection and analysis, growth model selection, mathematical modelling and Monte Carlo analysis in R programming language. Microbiological and physicochemical testing were carried out throughout the year on two types of cheeses in combination with a domestic refrigerator temperature survey and accompanying consumption questionnaire. Collected data were fitted to probability distributions using R. The appropriate growth model for the pathogen was selected based on an inoculation study performed on one of the raw‐milk cheeses and the chosen mathematical model was written into the R script developed for the QMRA. The dose–response model used the ingested dose calculated from the modelled concentration of L. monocytogenes at the time of consumption and the single serving size from the questionnaire to estimate the probability of illness. The final risk was expressed as probability of listeriosis for Polish consumers per serving of raw‐milk cheese

Possibility of replacing soybean meal with rapeseed meal in pig breeding

Chów trzody chlewnej w Unii Europejskiej opiera się głównie na zastosowaniu śruty sojowej, jako dodatku białkowego w paszach. Śruta sojowa, jak i soja, która jest surowcem do jej otrzymywania, pochodzi głównie z importu. Rodzime ziarna soi są wykorzystywane w niewielkim stopniu. Pomimo tego, iż śruta sojowa jest najczęściej zagospodarowywana jako dodatek do pasz, wciąż poszukuje się krajowych produktów, alternatywnych do soi, nadających się do hodowli trzody chlewnej. Ma to na celu uniezależnienie producentów pasz od importowanego produktu oraz obniżenie kosztów tuczu trzody chlewnej. Jedną z możliwości jest zastąpienie jej odpowiednio przygotowaną śrutą rzepakową. Dzięki procesowi uzdatnienia śruty rzepakowej dochodzi do obniżenia zawartości włókna surowego i glukozynolanów oraz zwiększenia ilości dostępnego białka, zwłaszcza aminokwasów egzogennych. W artykule scharakteryzowano oba surowce, przybliżono proces fermentacji śruty rzepakowej wraz z mikroorganizmami, jako jedną z alternatyw zastąpienia soi oraz przedstawiono aktualne wyniki badań dotyczące możliwości wykorzystania śruty rzepakowej w skarmianiu trzody chlewnej i jej wpływu na jakość mięsa.Pig breeding in the European Union is mainly based on the use of soybean meal as a protein source in feeding. Soybean meal, as well as soybean, which is a raw material for its production, comes mainly from imports. Native soybeans are used to a small extent. Despite the fact that soybean meal is most often used as a feed additive, domestic products, alternative to soybeans, suitable for pig farming are still being sought. This is to make feed producers independent of the imported product and reduce the costs of pig fattening. One option is to use rapeseed meal. Due to the treatment of rapeseed meal, the content of crude fiber and glucosinolates is reduced and the amount of available protein, especially essential amino acids, is increased. The article describes both raw materials, presents the fermentation process of rapeseed meal with microorganisms as one of the alternatives to replace soy, and presents the current results of research on the possibility of using rapeseed meal in feeding pigs and its impact on meat quality

Microbiological Quality and Safety of Traditional Raw Milk Cheeses Manufactured on a Small Scale by Polish Dairy Farms

Polish raw milk artisanal cheese may pose a threat to consumer safety due to pathogen presence. The aim of this study was to assess the microbiological safety, quality and physicochemical composition of cow’s and goat’s milk fresh cheeses produced by farmers on a small scale. A total of 62 samples of six cheese types were analyzed for Listeria monocytogenes, Salmonella spp., lactic acid bacteria and coliform presence and concentration levels. The physicochemical analysis estimated energy, water, protein, fat, carbohydrate, ash and salt content. The cheeses were also tested for heavy metal contamination. Listeria monocytogenes and Salmonella spp. were not detected in any of the samples. Coliforms were present in all the goat’s milk cheeses and only in two of the cow’s milk cheeses. Low levels of cadmium, below 0.008 ppm, were detected in three of the cows’ milk samples. The raw milk cheeses studied were free of the pathogens examined and were of high nutritional value

Immunochemical studies on R mutants of Yersinia enterocolitica O:3

Three mutants of Yersinia enterocolitica O:3, namely: YeO3-R1, YeO3-RfbR7 and YeO3-c-trs8-R were classified on the basis of sodium dodecyl sulphate/polyacrylamide gel electrophoresis (SDS/PAGE) profile of isolated lipopolysaccharides (LPS) as belonging to the Ra- (the first) and the Rc-type (the other two mutants). Methylation analysis, in addition to 13C and 1H NMR studies of purified core oligosaccharides revealed structures similar to those established previously for the full core of Y. enterocolitica O:3 in the case of the Ra mutant, and identical to that reported for the Rc mutant Ye75R, in the case of the two other mutants. The O-specific sugar, 6d-l-altrose, which forms a homopolymeric O-chain, was present in small amounts in all three LPS preparations, as well as in the core oligosaccharide preparations along with the Ra and the Rc sugars, characteristic of the Y. enterocolitica O:3 core. This result is in line with genetic data, indicating that it is the inner core region which is the receptor for the O-specific chain in Y. enterocolitica O:3. This region seems likewise to be the anchoring region for the enterobacterial common antigen (ECA), as shown by SDS/PAGE/Western blot analysis with monoclonal antibodies against ECA. In addition, we also demonstrated that the Ye75R mutant Rc and its parental strain Ye75S, both were ECA-immunogenic strains. So far, ECA-immunogenic strains, i.e. those with LPS-linked ECA, were only identified in E. coli mutants of the R1, R4 and K-12 serotype